Every Time a Bell Rings
by Keys2theKingdom
Summary: An Angel gets it's Wings. -5 part prequel to Wings-
1. part 00: the way it goes

"_sweet dreams are made of this,_

_who am i to disagree?"_

_-the eurythmics, sweet dreams (are made of this)_

**part 00: the way it goes**

there's Heaven, there's Hell, and there's Earth. and a long long time ago, before your thousandth grandfather's thousandth grandfather, they all existed in harmony.

(well—these things change.)

now it's a bloodbath.

basically, there's three types of Angels: Guardians fight for Heaven, Reapers for Hell, and Infants—called Charges by Guardians—live on Earth, unknowing, unseeing, unwitting, and unborn. these are the ranks of soldiers fighting the never ending war. being an Angel is random—no one knows exactly why certain people become them and some people don't. it has nothing to do with goodness, with morals or humanity- it's something about _them_ that makes them special. something in the way they think, the way they move and talk and act and do and _live_ that makes them amazing. that makes them Angels.

(but sometimes i wonder if that special something is a curse or a blessing.)

Heaven and Hell are what you'd expect them to be—great big storage vaults for almost everyone who's ever lived, except one of them is on fire.

(and of course you know the Earth—it's where you live after all)

Hell started it—the first ever Angels were Reapers sent by the Devil to corrupt the human race. because even now your good and your bad are weighed against each other and your soul is sent to the proper place to rest for eternity—it's just that the normal souls don't get that much attention anymore.

(wars always do make the headlines after all)

the Devil wanted more souls, at the heart of it the human race is predominately good after all, so he decided to _make_ them his. to change what should have happened into something else entirely. as you can imagine—chaos ran rampant. Heaven didn't know what to do, they couldn't believe that even the Devil would disturb souls from their rest and use them like that.

(souls are fragile—most will turn to dust the minute they're disturbed. some however, are stronger)

eventually, Heaven decided to fight fire with fire. they sent their own Angels—the first Guardians—to hold back the Reapers.

(but of course, nobody knew what they were doing. the addition of more Angels just threw Earth deeper into chaos)

the Earth was insane—and by this point neither Heaven nor Hell was accomplishing anything. so God proposed the introduction of Rules. a system by which to use Angels that kept the Earth in balance and let them conduct their war quietly and viciously in the background.

the Devil agreed, and order was restored.

(but at what cost? Angels are people too after all)

Angels are rare, unbelievably rare. one in one million people have the right soul for it, the right kind of soul that can be woken up and survive. of course, even Angels can't survive very long by themselves, they need someone to connect to, to cling to until their job is done.

(an Angel needs an Angel to survive)

Angels can be found on Earth as Infants a few years before they die, and at that point it is assigned both a Guardian and a Reaper.

the ultimate goal of a Reaper is to kill the infant before its time—the wrongness of the change, even if the Infant itself should have gone to Heaven, will send it straight to Hell. but first, the Reaper must kill its opposing Guardian. the Guardian's job is to stop the Reaper from killing, by killing the Reaper first.

(murder, murder everywhere. but is it murder if the victim is already dead?)

if it isn't killed before its time, every Infant will go to Heaven.

because, at the heart, every Angel is a good person- but they're also strong. strong and good don't often mix well. of course, the Angels have their own theories about the war. whispers twisted by bitterness and hurt, but still mostly true.

(of course they whisper—how can they not? they're only human after all)

* * *

><p><strong>AN: It's DOOOOOOONEEEE, or at least part 0... :P but i hope at the very least this clears up the ridiculously confusing part of Wings. these are personal stories of the Angels, it's sad and complicated; just forewarned.<strong>

**up next, the lunatic.**


	2. part 01: the lunatic

"_it seems you're having some trouble_

_in dealing with these changes,_

_living with these changes._

_oh no, the world is a scary place_

_...madness has now come over me."_

_-disturbed, down with the sickness_

** part 01: the lunatic**

Arthur hated the asylum. no color, no life, no anything. just noise- Whispers into his ears, Whispers into his _mind _and the screams of the damned that echoed both inside and out and ripped their way out of his mouth. there were too many Voices, too many Voices, Arthur didn't know which ones were good and which ones were bad and which ones were real and which ones were in his head.

he had been fine until the medicine, there had only been good Voices before the medicine. they said the medicine was to make him better but all it did was bring more Voices and confuse him until he couldn't tell up from left and right from down.

too many Voices, too much medicine and too much treatment that was only making him scream.

the people were the worst, the Voices Arthur could ignore if he tried hard enough but the people never left him alone. they tied him down and stabbed him with needles and electrocuted him and even when he tried to tell them that they were hurting him they just didn't listen and they didn't care that Arthur was screaming and the Voices were screaming and the whole world was screaming because it _hurt _so much.

the Doctor scared him.

Arthur wasn't even sure if he was a doctor, the people said he was a doctor, but he didn't act like one. doctors smiled and gave away lollipops- doctors made you better, they didn't make you scream.

doctors didn't hurt you, but the Doctor always did.

he had to see him every week- Arthur knew it was a week because the Voices helped him remember how to count the days on his wall- all alone, and sometimes nothing bad would happen, sometimes is would just be how-do-you-feel-Arthur's and okay-you-can-go-back –to-your-room-now's. those days Arthur wasn't scared and everything was fine. but sometimes, most times, the Doctor would lock the door. after that he would give Arthur some medicine and then he would make Arthur scream.

when the Doctor was done he'd smile and unlock the door, and Arthur then the people would take Arthur back to his room and they would never ever listen when Arthur tried to tell them that the Doctor had hurt him. the people would just put Arthur back in his cell and then close the door and then sometimes there would be supper- but sometimes there wasn't .

there was always more medicine though.

the Voices kept him company though. the Voices talked to him, helped him draw pictures on the walls and invented songs for Arthur to hum to pass the time. those Voices were like the ones back home, except they were louder and there were more of them.

but there were other Voices too- and those Arthur had to ignore. those voices made Arthur do bad things- even if Arthur couldn't remember what they were.

Arthur wondered what was happening.

the Doctor was screaming. he had a medicine needle stuck in his eye, and it was bleeding a lot.

the Voices were happy.

Arthur was confused.

the people rushed in- they were all screaming and there was too much noise and Arthur didn't like it. he put his hands over his ears and squeezed his eyes shut—but the noise wouldn't stop. the Voices wouldn't be quiet and the people wouldn't stop talking and the doctor wouldn't stop _screaming_. or was he the one screaming? Arthur couldn't tell.

rough hands grabbed him, trying to hold him still. someone took out a needle, quickly stabbing Arthur with it before he could get away.

when Arthur woke up, he was in his room. the Voices buzzed in his ear, whispering, but Arthur ignored them. when had he come back here, he wondered. he looked down, wondering why his shirt and hands were dirty. he wondered why they were red.

the Voices kept whispering.

no one came to see Arthur that day. no one brought him food, no one took him to see the Doctor, no one brought him any medicine. Arthur wondered where everyone went. he had peered under the door a few times and poked his fingers out, but no one was there. everything was quiet. there was no _blonk blonk_ of the boots that the big people wore, no soft _tap tap_ of the ladies who brought him to the Doctor and gave him his medicine. even the moderate _click click_ of the Doctor's feet were absent.

the only noises were the Voices, still whispering.

suddenly, much later, there was noise. Arthur looked up from his drawing on the wall, there were so many footsteps, which meant so many people, and Arthur wondered why they were all there. his door opened, and two big hands grabbed him, picking him up and taking him from his room. Arthur screamed-he was scared.

they took him to a room he had never been in before—they tried to tie him into a chair, but Arthur kept flailing and scratching and biting, too scared to stay still. suddenly the familiar pain of a needle under his skin made him tense, and then Arthur fell limp, unable to move.

the Voices were screaming in rage and fear and glee—Arthur's head was spinning.

he was tied down, his face positioned to stare directly at a light. it hurt his eyes. a man walked in—he picked up a long needle and a hammer. someone held Arthur's eye open.

the last thing Arthur remembered was pain.

**AN: **Oh look, crazy Arthur. What a surprise. This is 1942, a very bad time for asylums. Arthur is schizophrenic. He killed his entire family, and then he killed his doctor. The ending is Arthur getting a lobotomy. If you don't know what a lobotomy is, basically a doctor stabs a needle into the corner of your eye where your skull is weak, and stabs into the part of your brain that controls voluntary function. A lobotomy will turn you into a vegetable—your brain is dead. You're still alive, but only physically. It was a very popular way to deal with the criminally insane back then. Arthur's went wrong and he died.

More backstory:

Arthur used to talk to people who weren't there. He was harmless, but his parents tried to make him better. They didn't want to send him to an asylum, so Arthur's dad (a pharmacist) just stole medicine from work and they gave it to Arthur. This only made him worse, it scrambled his head pretty bad, but they wouldn't stop trying to give him meds. One day Arthur snapped and killed them all, his brothers, his mom, his dad, everyone. He doesn't remember doing it. When the cops got there they found the whole family dead, and Arthur with a knife talking to himself. He got sent to an asylum. In case that part was unclear, Arthur's doctor was raping him. The 'medicine' he would give Arthur kept him from fighting back or screaming during it, and also left him too out of it to say anything sensible to the nurses. The day that Arthur stabbed him in the eye he forgot to dose him, and Arthur stabbed him in self defense. He obviously didn't remember that either.


End file.
